Northwestern University fraternities thought they were doing the right and noble thing, hanging banners off the sides of their houses reminding students that it was Sex Assault Awareness Month.
But not only was the move not enough to satisfy campus social justice warriors, some SJWs forced the fraternities to issue a blanket apology for their effort, because their signs might have “triggered” some students.
The signs read “This is Everyone’s Problem” and noted that each fraternity “Stands With Survivors of Sexual Violence” and “Supports Survivors.”
But apparently, simply recognizing sexual violence as a problem and informing your fellow students about the dangers of campus sexual assault—something campus feminists have been exhorting (and, in some ways, extorting) their fellow college students to do ad nauseum —is not enough to silence the clamoring harpy hordes.
Campus feminists published an op-ed, chastising the fraternities for their lack of self awareness in daring to address a “rampant” problem head on, and calling the banners nothing more than a “cruel reminder” that fraternities are cesspools of male privilege and impropriety. Activists even gave interviews to Northwestern’s student newspaper. “To display a banner [saying] that ‘We support survivors’ is really something you have to earn by actually walking the walk,” one student told the Daily Northwestern.
Unfortunately, the fraternities were punished for taking even the first steps. And worse, Northwestern’s Interfraternity Council actually issued an apology for the signs, taking full responsibility for not being “cognizant” of the signs’ implications. The Council even committed to a long-term education plan, so that they never make the mistake of attempting to address societal ills in a productive manner ever again. But that also might not be enough. The student who spoke to the Daily Northwestern suggested a full on fraternity reprogramming: “It’s a matter of focusing on the kind of culture change that needs to happen for any sort of banner like that not to be ultimately hypocritical.”
Campus feminist fury is nothing new to Northwestern, of course. Last year, Northwestern’s local social justice warriors protested—and filed Title IX discrimination charges—against a feminist professor who had the gall to suggest that modern feminism, and the sexual paranoia that has flooded college campuses, was infantilizing women, cutting off academic discourse and actually endangering students. The nerve.